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(more to follow)

Do you tutor or lead workgroups? We supply Workshops …

November 2016: Launch of the first independent full-day workshop, Perceptions of Time, by Myra Schneider. Suitable for individuals or for working in a group. more here

Second Light Workshops

We aim to fulfil our promise of ‘inclusivity’ for poets who are unable to travel to Second Light workshop events, however, our Remote Workshops are pitched at anyone wanting to enjoy a ‘work-out’ and/or kick-start a new selection of work. We also aim to keep our prices low enough for all to access.

The workshops involve many varied exercises to stimulate new writing, some involving experimenting with formal forms and other approaches you may not have tried. They include notes and discussion points, simulating thoughts and comments of the sort that might be exchanged between participants in a ‘live’ workshop.

Poems by women participants are eligible for consideration for ARTEMISpoetry, over and above any submission made under the general submission guidelines.

Time plays a central role in every aspect of our lives. The workshop explores ways in which we perceive time and how we represent these perceptions in writing.

Past experience crucially influences how we view the present and future. Earth’s distant past, cosmological time are difficult to imagine … Clock time is fixed but our impressions of time are subjective – an hour’s enjoyable exercise session will seem to be over quickly, but the minutes drag during a boring lecture…

Would it be helpful to have feedback on your work from the workshop tutor? For an additional £15 fee payable directly to Myra Schneider you can get feedback and pointers on one poem which has come out of the workshop. Please send the poem (either hard copy or as an e-mail attachment) and payment to Myra, cheques made out to ‘Myra Schneider’, together with your e-mail address. Myra will send you her comments by e-mail. Myra’s land address is: 130 Morton Way, Southgate, London N14 7AL and her e-mail address is here

8 workshops, each with a suggested minimum time of 2 hours and with extended working options to boost them up to 4-5 hours; overall, a full short poetry course. The series is drawn on poems in all sections of Fanfare, Second Light’s anthology published in November 2015. “This unique collection showcases some truly wonderful poetry: inspiring, enriching and consoling – a deeply pleasurable read.” – Hannah Lowe.

The series titles and outlines (fuller descriptions in the Prospectus):

1. A FOCUS ON OBJECTS – a seed, a gift given or received – have resonance which we may draw on. Also looks at the Pantoum form.

2. TELLING A STORY – handling narrative effectively; using invention, story and fable.

3. USING ‘VOICE’ – a bird, a refugee, a suicide? The scope for using non-standard English and ‘song’

4. KEEPING UP WITH ‘NOW’ – considers change and contrast through time; what has disappeared, newly appeared. Modern mind-sets and the List Poem.

5. OFF-THE-BEATEN-TRACK SUBJECT MATTER – the specialised or obscure, now up for grabs? Inspiration from data-rich sources. Also looks at the Couplet form.

6. THE POETRY OF PROTEST & PERSUASION – the timeless nature of protest poetry – bad manners or major evil. Dialogue poetry and address to the supreme being …

8. THE (ALMOST) LOVE POEM – considers how contemporary poets tend to approach the theme of love from oblique angles, at times through old forms. Starting a poem from ‘the periphery’ exploiting the paradoxes of falling love, and using the Sonnet and Ghazal.

The workshops can be bought as single workshops, or as the full series, and by individuals who wish to work on them alone or tutors/leaders who wish to use them in a group of 5 or more. We have kept the price extremely low – starting at £8 for a single workshop for individual working (reliant on having or buying a copy of Fanfare) – well below what the rate should be for such a substantial body of authorial work, therefore, though tutors/leaders may customise the workshops as they wish, they may not copyright or publish adaptations. The copyright of these workshops is held by Dilys Wood.

8 workshops, each with a suggested minimum time of 2 hours and with extended working options to boost them up to 4-5 hours; overall, a full short poetry course. The series is linked with the eight sections of Her Wings of Glass, Second Light’s anthology published in October 2014, which Moniza Alvi has called “tremendously inspiring”.

The series titles and outlines: (Workshop numbers correspond with Section number in Her Wings of Glass

1. ENCOUNTERS with the natural world – the focus is on describing living creatures /plant life; writing poems ‘in voice’; the Haiku form.

2. SAVING THE PLANET – the focus is on writing politically; writing about water; Concrete Poetry; laying the poem out on the page.

3. WAR ON HUMANITY – the focus is on: writing ‘slant’ about our experience of threatening events; the use of formal forms, including the sonnet, to ‘contain’ and control difficult / emotive subject matter.

4. THE HUMAN FAMILY: suffering and survival – the focus is on: writing about ‘family’, including abuse; using the Pantoum poetic form; using ‘Big Metaphor’.

5. THE HEART’S AFFECTIONS – the focus is on: having ‘crushes’; writing convincingly about intimacy; the Ghazal poetic form.

6. MAKING: creativity & invention – the focus is on places where we write; metaphorical descriptions of the creative process; the funny side of ‘welcoming the muse’.

7. LOOKING FOR MEANING – the focus is on poems which develop theories (including two poems on the development of children); constructing poems around questions; the prose poem.

8. IMAGINATION: visions, dreams, imagining – the focus is on poems based on dreams; poems referring to ghosts; ‘magic realism’.

The workshops can be bought as single workshops, or as the full series, and by individuals who wish to work on them alone or tutors/leaders who wish to use them in a group of 5 or more. We have kept the price extremely low – starting at £8 for a single workshop for individual working (reliant on having or buying a copy of Her Wings of Glass) – well below what the rate should be for such a substantial body of authorial work, therefore, though tutors/leaders may customise the workshops as they wish, they may not copyright or publish adaptations. The copyright of these workshops is held by Dilys Wood.